A release from the National Federation of State High School Associations on rules changes for boys lacrosse:

A focus on sportsmanship and risk minimization highlighted many of the rules changes approved by the NFHS Boys Lacrosse Rules Committee at its July 16-18 meeting in Indianapolis. All 16 rules revisions were subsequently approved by the Board of Directors.

Three Coloradans have been chosen by a panel as part of 40 of the nation’s top high school lacrosse players who will compete in the third annual 2012 ESPNHS Warrior 40 Competition on Tuesday and Wednesday at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park.

Wheat Ridge’s Pete Aplet, Rock Canyon’s Wilkins Dismuke and Regis Jesuit’s Brian Wagner will represent Colorado. All are seniors. Aplet and Wagner will play at Denver, and Dismuke at Johns Hopkins.

Practice and skills competition will be from 9:30 a.m.-1 p.m. on Tuesday and the final competition will be from 10 a.m.-noon on Wednesday.

It will focus on improving the skills and knowledge of the nation’s elite high school lacrosse players. Competitors will receive advanced one-on-one lacrosse instruction and learn life skills lessons from past and present Major League Lacrosse athletes.

Summer baseball, to some kids, carries more weight than the high school season. And a few of those summer leagues are now nearing their postseasons.

The Colorado Coaches League gets underway Wednesday, while Legion ball has its state tournaments dotting the calendar this month and next. (Connie Mack held its state tournaments earlier this month.)

Legion’s top league, A, holds its state tournament Aug. 1-4 in Boulder, with a regional tournament following Aug. 9-13 in Fairfield, Calif. (Legion B has two state tournaments, both July 26-29, separated into North/Metro Denver and Mountain/Eastern playoffs. The state tournaments for Legion C and D are also July 26-29.) Read more…

Chatfield won the Red Bull Game Breakers 7-on-7 title over the weekend, claiming one of the top football events of the summer.

The Chargers came out of the losers bracket and then beat Denver South twice — both times, 14-13 — on Saturday to win the championship. Both schools received invites to the 7-on-7 national finals in Dallas next month.

“Our team is different in that there is no one star player, with in through teamwork,” coach Bret McGatlin said in a release. “Going to Dallas will build our confidence.”

Yes, Air Academy is certainly in the conversation. But there hasn’t been clear-cut dominance like we saw last season, when Regis Jesuit won an unprecedented nine state titles. So I spent the better part of today going through the 2011-12 school year to find an answer — looking only at team championships, not individual titles.

Centaurus’s Emma Lazaroff became the single most prolific girls goal scorer in one season in the brief history of the sport in Colorado on Thursday against Golden.

Just 26 seconds into the game, Lazaroff scored goal No. 126 this season en route to scoring 10 more on the Demons in a 24-7 rout in the Jeffco League.

Also in the Jeffco: Ralston Valley got six goals from Jenny Adams in an 18-15 win over Wheat Ridge.

In the Mountain League: Eagle Valley’s Haley Hutton scored three times in a 7-5 win over Steamboat Springs in Gypsum. … Game of the night might have been out in Grand Junction, where Fruita Monument, behind six goals from Lindsey Burenheide, beat Battle Mountain 11-10.

That distinction is an important one. Since CHSAA made the switch to a true-seeded bracket in 2009, top-eight seeds are 22-2 in the second round. The lone exceptions? Mountain Vista beating Mullen last season (a No. 10 over a No. 7) and Chatfield beating Mountain Vista in 2009 (a 9 over an 8).

A quick breakdown of the first-round games, which will be later this week, is below. The higher seed is 12-4, including 7-1 last year, in first round games over the past two seasons.

Neil Devlin, originally from the Philadelphia area, has covered high school sports in Colorado for more than 30 years, writing about the people, athletes and events that encompass the Rocky Mountain prep sports world.